Mariotte, Edme

Mariotte, Edme ĕd´mə märyôt´ [key], 1620?–1684, French physicist. His De la nature de l'air (1676) includes a statement of Boyle's law (see gas laws ), which he discovered independently and which is sometimes called Mariotte's law in France. One of the founders of experimental physics, Mariotte investigated a wide range of phenomena, including the motion of bodies, sound, hydrodynamics, barometry, color, and vision.